Rabindranath Tagore and Romain Rolland Correspondence (1919-1940)

Edited by Prof. Chinmoy Guha

Bridging East and West

Rabindranath Tagore and Romain Rolland Correspondence (1919-1940)

Edited by Prof. Chinmoy Guha

Description

The amazing inter-cultural correspondence (1919-1940) between two cultural icons of the twentieth century, Nobel laureates from the East and the West: the Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) and the French novelist, playwright, and biographer, Romain Rolland (1866-1944), has remained undiscovered for far too long.

This work brings together, for the first time in English, these letters and telegrams that are among the finest exchanges of thought between the East and the West, and script the intellectual history of that period. It is also the story of a profound friendship, where Tagore and Rolland unlock their hearts to each other. The book also records the differences of opinion and misunderstandings between the two outstanding humanists of contemporary history, who often felt isolated in their own countries, on serious issues like Gandhi and Fascism. It comprises Rolland's correspondence with the radical Saumyendranath Tagore, and the whole debate on the Tagore-Mussolini controversy.

This majestic and serene correspondence, comprising 46 letters and telegrams, along with three dialogues between the two at various times, as well as letters by Rathindranath Tagore and others, is a journey towards the imaging of a different world which would create the possibility of a new space outside cultural hegemony. Edited and annotated by one of India's foremost French scholars, it is one of the most important quests for an alternative discourse in the last century.

Bridging East and West

Rabindranath Tagore and Romain Rolland Correspondence (1919-1940)

Edited by Prof. Chinmoy Guha

Author Information

Edited by Prof. Chinmoy Guha, Professor, University of Calcutta

Chinmoy Guha is professor of English and former chair, University of Calcutta, former Vice-Chancellor of Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata, and Director of Publications, Embassy of France in India, New Delhi. He has been the literary editor of the prestigious Bengali literary magazine 'Desh' for a decade (2003—2012). The French Government conferred on him the titles of Chevalier des Palmes Académiques (2010) and Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres (2013). He received the Vidyasagar Puroshkar from the West Bengal Government in 2017. He was a member of the jury of the first Prix Romain Rolland, instituted by the Embassy of France in 2018. His works include 'Where the Dreams Cross: T. S. Eliot and French Poetry, The Tower and the Sea: Romain Rolland-Kalidas Nag Correspondence 1922-1938' (Sahitya Akademi), 'Tagore at Home in the World' (co-ed, Sage Publications), a biography of Victor Hugo and Bengali translations of La Rochefoucauld's 'Maxims', Flaubert's 'The Dictionary of Received Ideas',